On Wednesday, the state's highest court will consider Longmont's voter-approved ban on hydraulic fracturing within city limits.

Longmont voters added the ban to the drilling method, also called fracking, to the City Charter in 2012, convinced that a city-negotiated set of regulations on oil and gas drilling didn't go far enough.

Both the regulations and the ban brought lawsuits from the Colorado Oil and Gas Association, an industry trade group. The oil and gas regulations lawsuit was dismissed as part of a compromise brokered by Gov. John Hickenlooper before the 2014 election.

The suit on the charter ban, however, has progressed through district court and the Colorado Court of Appeals and is now before the Colorado Supreme Court.

The city has argued that the state allows for local control, that Longmont voters should be able prohibit a type of drilling in city limits.

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"Home rule cities are not mere subordinates to the State," the city's attorneys Eugene Mei, Dan Kramer and Phillip Barber wrote in the city's opening brief to the Colorado Court of Appeals. "In matters of local concern, home rule cities stand on equal footing with the State and their laws supersede state law in a conflict. ... Here, the City presented dozens of documents showing that local interests — in protecting the community's health, safety and welfare from the risks of fracking — are real and strong."

The city of Longmont has been joined in the case on its side by Food and Water Watch, the Sierra Club, Earthworks and local group Our Health, Our Future, Our Longmont.

The Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, a state agency, and oil and gas developer TOP Operating have joined COGA in the suit.

COGA and its supporters have maintained that a ban on fracking could lead to a patchwork of frackable and unfrackable areas around the state when oil shales don't conform to city limits, county lines or other municipalities. They argue that because the state has such an interest in applying oil and gas regulations uniformly across Colorado, the state's permission of fracking preempts Longmont's ban.

Fracking uses the injection of a high-pressure mix of water, sand and chemicals underground to break open formations and make it easier to recover oil and gas. It's a widespread practice that led to an energy boom. Opponents worry about health and environmental effects while the industry says it's one of the less impactful options.

The city of Fort Collins will also have an attorney arguing its case on Wednesday against COGA. Fort Collins instituted a moratorium on fracking.

There are two important Colorado Supreme Court cases that are relevant to Longmont's fracking case, and both were decided on the same day in 1992: Voss. v. Lundvall Bros. Inc. and Bowen/Edwards Associates Inc. v. the Board of County Commissioners of La Plata County.

Voss (the name of the Greeley city clerk at the time) occurred when Greeley voters implemented a ban on drilling oil and gas wells. Lundvall Bros. and other oil companies in the city sued, and after an appeal, the Colorado Supreme Court found in favor of Lundvall.

Justice Joseph Quinn said in the opinion that while a city still had some authority over drilling in its limits, because there was a "statewide interest in the efficient development and production of oil and gas resources," a city could not totally ban the practice altogether.

In Bowen/Edwards, an oil company disagreed with La Plata County's regulations requiring oil and gas developers to obtain permits. In that case, the state's highest court found in favor of the county, saying that the county was within its rights to add on regulations as long as the regulations didn't conflict with the state's.

On Wednesday morning, seven Colorado Supreme Court justices will hear oral arguments in both Longmont's and Fort Collins' cases. In oral argument, each side has 30 minutes to present their case while fielding questions from the justices.

After that, the Supreme Court justices can take as long as they like to issue a ruling.

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